Taxes

Yet again, the recent Welsh assembly election campaign was primarily about how best to spend public money. However, recent developments mean devolved elections in Wales will soon focus on how best to raise public money, too.

The English tax accountant Richard Murphy has done more than anyone to expose tax havens. Now Murphy says businesses are scared witless of appearing on the front pages and we are seeing a shift in their behaviour, even though there are many battles ahead.

The release of the Panama papers is yet to reach its endgame, but there are some clear truths we can take from it. People or businesses that don’t pay their taxes – whether deliberately or through ignorance – undermine state revenues. They also distort competition by putting the non-compliant at an advantage, and they increase inequality, as it is the better off who more often tend to escape their obligations.

The so-called Panama Papers span thousands of pages, revealing that many of the world’s elite have been hiding their money in offshore accounts in an attempt to shield their income from taxes. Their release – the biggest data leak in history – depicts a world of rampant tax noncompliance. However, it also reveals just how vulnerable all electronic data in the 21st century are to discovery.

The aim of progressive taxation and the welfare state is to redistribute wealth from the richest to the poorest in an effort to erode the worst aspects of poverty and inequality. How well the British tax and benefits system is doing towards this aim can be seen in the latest, newly released inequality statistics from the Office of National Statistics.

The Australian Taxation Office is reported to be playing a “lead role” in sharing intelligence between tax officials from OECD countries, as part of the continuing fallout from the revelations of the Panama Papers. The Joint International Tax Shelter Information Collaboration, which is chaired by ATO head Chris Jordan, was being convened in Paris overnight, Australian time.

The tax dealings of a number of politicians have come under scrutiny, following news of their offshore holdings in the Panama Papers. The leaks have led to the resignation of the Icelandic prime minister – and the UK Prime Minister, David Cameron, has been criticised for shares he used to have in an offshore fund set up by his late father.

It’s that time of year again: tax-filing season. Millions of Americans are probably downloading the latest version of their tax preparation software as we speak or picking it up at their local software store.